A first-hand look at Saudia's A330 business class between Jeddah and Riyadh, covering the lounge, seat, entertainment, food, and service.
How much is a beer or wine ?
What are your thoughts on Jeddah’s airport? How would you compare that to the other ME airports? Granted, it is a huge improvement over the previous ones…
@ Aaron -- Yeah, it's definitely a huge improvement, but I wouldn't rank it among my favorites in the region. The thing that stands out to me most is that Wi-Fi in the airport is really, really slow, across the board. That was the case on this trip, and on my previous transit.
JED was my home airport for the last 5 years and, believe me, it is a very modern and efficient airport. I very much prefer it over almost any European or US airport I know. Wonderful architecture, spacious checkin areas, efficient security, good lounges and also immigration is not too bad (I never had to wait for more than 15 minutes, usually 2 to 5 minutes). Ben's comment about WiFi is probably right. I only used WiFi once as 5G was really fast enough. In the Middle East maybe DOH is a bit better, but only a bit. JED certainly is way better than DXB, RUH, AUH, MCT, BAH or KWI.
The airport is on a huge plot of land so the taxi from gate to runway usually takes at least 15 minutes.
Also, JED has a separate terminal, called the Hajj terminal. This terminal mainly serves charter flights for pilgrims to nearby Mecca, so I have not had the opportunity to depart from or arrive at that terminal. This must be quite a different experience - not old-fashioned or bad but quite different.
When flying through DXB I mainly used Terminal 1 which basically is for all airlines other than EK. And believe me Terminal ! is quite a wreck, quite old-fashioned, inefficient, not well organised lines at security and/or immigration and the terrible commute to concourse D. There is not one single aspect which I found to be better in DXB T1 than in JED. As for Terminal 3 I mainly used it for connecting flights and only once for arriving to Dubai. DXB T3 is a bit more modern and maybe is more comparable to JED but from the overall feel I clearly find JED superior.
Agree 100% with the comments about Immigration Officers at DOH & DXB. They are the worst. never smile at you and treat everyone like they are there to be a Burden or to provide Cheap Labor. Just so happens 99.9% of Immigration Officers are of Arab descent. Maybe they are not used to be working?
So what's the story on the date placed directly on the table? Did you even eat it?! heh
And it makes sense for the meal to be the most flavourful you've had onboard as Middle Eastern cuisine does feature tons of spices and your tastebuds are less sensitive in the air. So it's the perfect vehicle (excuse the pun) to have meals with a lot of spice added.
Yes, please, what is the story with the date? I believe when Ben posted the initial thoughts on this review, he said he'd share those details...
@ Mike O. -- Hah, you have good memory. Yeah, so clearly the intent is that you eat the date and then drink the coffee, so there's not even usually a need to place it down. However, I of course wanted to take a picture, and I value the quality of that over actually enjoying the date.
So I did put the date down, and then didn't eat it. However, I did several times have second thoughts, and wondered "meh, what's the worst that could happen?"
Thanks for the update!
And btw, the other fish dish that you described as the best was from Chicago to Hong Kong on Cathay Pacific in 2011 where you had the seabass and your mouth was watering just thinking about it. It was moist and flaky from how you described it.
@ Mike O. -- Man, you have incredible memory! I have to say, I have a hard time directly comparing two fish dishes 15 years apart, but I do remember that being really good.
"This was perhaps the most flavorful fish dish I’ve ever been served on a plane."
I remember the same description a fish dish you had on Cathay Pacific years ago and you said your mouth was watering just thinking about it.
So this and the fish you had on Cathay Pacific is the most flavourful fish dish you had hah 😉
I have traveled buisness class with Saudia many many times all over the world and would recomend them at any time, brilliant Airline
Curious. This was authentic Saudi tradition. Were men on flight served by male flight attendsnts and women served by women? Just curious.
On my 100 plus flights on SV (most of them on JED-RUH/RUH-JED) both male and female FAs served male or female passengers, regardless. Having lived there for a number of years I am always amazed at the public perception in the western hemisphere of Saudi society and living.
Unless you plan to get drunk on a flight SV is quite a good airline!
@ ClownDancer -- As noted Scio_nescio, there's no difference in service based on gender. That being said, on this flight all flight attendants I saw were foreign women, so there were no local men.
The date right on the tray table! Not even a napkin!
Dates and Saudi coffee are being served pre-flight. All dates are individually wrapped in cellophane - at least they were when I was flying this route 100 plus time over the last few years. And they do have napkins.
I wonder how the service transformation has happened? Did they sack all those crew who sat in the business cabin doing no work or what?
@ Nikojas -- I'd be fascinated to know as well, though I can't imagine I can ever get a straight answer on that. Hah.
I will say, I don't know him personally, but I've been really impressed by Rossen Dimitrov, the company's Chief Customer Experience Officer, as he started in his role in 2023. I think he deserves a lot of credit for the service transformation we've seen at the airline.
Those asking about date on tray, I guess it was given in hand and then Ben put it on table for picture may be, my guess only, no offence.
Metamorphosis is indeed the right word! I still remember those Dubai–Jeddah flights when the culinary experience consisted of a few biscuits and a packet of chips, served with an enthusiasm that suggested we should be grateful they had remembered us at all! 😄
Then along came Emirates and, quite literally, shook up the neighbourhood. It is wonderful to see Saudia not just waking up, but waking up in style. Competition can be a remarkably effective alarm clock — and, thankfully for passengers,
Saudia is really impressing me. Wi-Fi for $50 though, lol. Still, not a deal-breaker. Great flight.
With only ten day to wait for the World Airline Rankings to be published, some airlines will be ‘bricking’ it.
One minute I’m a Diamond geezer the next I’m only a guest, much has changed since I last logged on.